A Jay of Italy Read online

  *CHAPTER V*

  Messer Lanti and his party entered Milan, in a very subdued mood, by theGate of Saint Mark. It had been with an emotion beyond words that Bembohad found himself approaching the walls of this fair city of his dreams.The prosperous contado, watered in every direction by broad dykes; theclustering vines and saintly-hued olive gardens; the busy peasantry; therichness of the very wayside shrines, had all appeared to speak acontent and holiness with which the perverse passions of men were atsuch bitter variance. The discrepancy confounded, as it was presentlyupon a fuller experience to inspire, him. Here in one land, incessantlyjostling and reacting on one another, were a devotional and a sensuousfervour, both exhibiting a lust of beauty at fever-heat; were a grosssuperstition and an excellent reason; were a powerful priestcraft and ajeering scepticism--all drawing from the forehead of a Papacy, which,latterly pledged to the most unscrupulous temporal self-aggrandisement,was reverenced for the vicarship of a poor and celibate Christ.Issuing, equipped with an artless conventual purpose, from the coolgroves of his cloister, he found a land dyed in blood and the blue ofheaven, festering under God's sun, and rejoicing in the colour schemesof its sores. On what principle could he study to sweeten this paradoxof a constitution, where health was enamoured of disease? '_Deus meus,in te confido_,' he prayed, with hands clasped fervently upon hisbreast; '_Non erubescam, neque irrideant me inimici mei_! O Lord, giveme the vision to find and show to others a path through this beautifulwilderness!'

  As the long walls of the town, broken at intervals into turrets,broadened before him, violet against a deep, cloudless sky, his ecstasybut increased--he held out his arms.

  'O thou,' he murmured, 'that I have hungered for, looking down on theefrom the mountain of myrrh! Until the day break and the shadows fleeaway!'

  A little later, in a deep angle of the enceinte, they came upon agruesome sight. This was no less than the Montmartre of Milan--a greatstone gallows with dangling chains, and tenanted--faugh! A cloud ofwinged creatures rose as they approached, and scattered, droppingfragments. It was the common repast, stuff of rogues andpilferers--nothing especial. The ground was trodden underneath, andBembo shrieked to see two white, stiff feet sticking from it. Lantifollowed the direction of his hand, and exclaimed with a moody shrug:--

  'An assassin, Saint--nothing more. We plant them like that, head down.'

  'Alive?'

  'O, of course!'

  Bembo cried out: 'These are not sons of God, but of Belial!' and passedon, with his head drooping. Carlo turned to Beatrice, where she rodebehind, and, without a word, pointed significantly to the horriblevision. She laughed, and went by unmoved.

  In a little after they had all entered by the gate, and the city wasbefore them. Bembo, kindled against his will, rose in his saddle anduttered an exclamation of delight. Before his eyes was spread a whitetown with blue water and upstanding cypresses--wedges of midnight inmidday. There were terraces and broad flagged walks, and palaces andspacious loggias--fair glooms of marble shaken in the spray offountains. From its cold, shadowless bridges to the heaped drift of theduomo in its midst, there seemed no slur, but those dark cypresses, onall its candid purity. It looked like a city flushed under a veil ofhoar frost, the glare of its streets and markets and gardens subdued toone softest harmony of opal.

  Yet in quick contrast with this chill, sweet austerity, glowed theburning life of it. In the distance, like travelling sparks in woodashes; nearer, flashing from roof or balcony in harlequin spots oflight; nearest of all, a very baggage-rout of figures, fantastic,chameleonic, an endless mutation and interflowing of blues, andcrimsons, and purples--tirelessly that life circulated, the hot arterialblood which gave their tender hue to those encompassing veins of marble.

  It was on this drift of souls going by him, gay and light, it seemed, asblown petals, that Bernardo gazed with the most loving fondness. Hepictured them all, eager, passionate, ardent, moving about the businessof the Nature-God, propagating His Gospel of sweetness, adapting toimperishable works the endlessly varying arabesques of woods, and starrymeadows, and running clouds and waters--epitomising His System. Headmired these works, their beauty, their stability, their triumphantachievement; though, in truth, his soul of souls could conceive noachievement for man so ideal as a world of glorious gardens and littleabodes. But the sun was once more in his heart, and heaven in his eyes.

  The swallows stooped in the streets to welcome him: 'Hail, little priestof the cloistered hills!' The scent of flowers offered itself theincense to his ritual; the fountains leapt more merrily for his coming.'Love! love!' sang the birds under the great eaves; 'He will woo thiscruel world to harmlessness. Where men shall lead with charity, allanimals shall follow. The good fruits ripen to be eaten; it is theirlove, their lust to be consumed in joy. What lamb ever gave its throatto the knife? The violet flowers the thicker the more its blossoms areravished. What new limb ever budded on a maimed beast?'

  'Ah! the secret,' sang Bembo's soul--'the secret, or the secretgrievance, of the cosmos will yield itself only to love. Useless to tryto wrench forth its confession by torture. Let retaliation spell love,for once and for ever, and to the infinite sorrows of life will appearat last their returned Redeemer.'

  His heart was full as they rode by the narrow streets. His eyes and earswere tranced with colour, the murmur of happy voices, the clash ofmelodious bells. He could not think of that late vision of horror butas a dream. These blithe souls, in all their moods and worships suchtrue apostles of his gay, sweet God! They could not love or practiseharshness but as a deterrent from things unnameable. The very absenceof sightseers from that pit of scowling death proved it.

  And then, in a moment, they had debouched upon an open place overlookedby a massive fortress, and in its midst, the cynosure of hundreds ofgloating eyes, was a human thing under the flail--a voice moaning fromthe midst of a red jelly.

  His heart sunk under a very avalanche. He uttered a cry so loud as toattract the attention of the spectators nearest.

  'Who is it? What hath he done?' he roared of one. 'Trampled on theHost? Defiled a virgin of the mother? Murdered a priest?'

  The face puckered and grinned.

  'Worse, Messer Cavalier. He once whipped the Duke when his tutor.'

  Bembo's whole little body braced itself to the spring.

  'Tutor!' he cried: 'is that, then, Cola Montano?'

  The gross eye winked--

  'What is left of it.'

  He was answered with a leap and rush. The mob at that point staggered,and bellowed, and fell away from the hoofs of a furious assailant.Carlo, pre-admonished, was already on the boy's flank. 'Stop, littlelunatic!' he shouted, sweating and spurring to intervene. He had noconcern for the feet he trampled or the ribs he bruised. He stooped andsnatched at the struggling horse's bridle. 'It is the Duke's vengeance!'he panted. 'See him there above! Art mad?'

  A face, flushed as the face of Him who scourged the hucksters from thetemple, was turned upon him.

  'Art thou? Strike for retaliation by love, or get behind!'

  'Know'st nothing of his deserts,' cried Carlo. 'Be advised!'

  'By love,' cried the boy. 'He is worthy of it--a good man--I carry aletter to him from my father. Fall back, I say.'

  He drove in his heels, and the horse plunged and started, tearing therein from Lanti's grasp. It was true that Bembo bore this letter, amongothers, in his pouch. The Abbot of San Zeno was so long out of the worldas to have miscalculated the durations of court favour. Cola had been aninfluence in _his_ time.

  'Devil take him!' growled Carlo; but he followed, scowling and slashing,in his wake. The mob, authorised of its worst humour, took histruculence ill. That reduced him to a very devilish sobriety. He beganto strike with an eye to details, 'blazing' his passage through thethrong. The method justified itself in the opening out of a human lane,at the end of which he saw Bembo spring upon the stage.

  The executioner w
as cutting deliberately, monotonously on, and asmonotonously the voice went moaning. Messer Jacopo, standing at ironease beside, took no thought, it seemed, of anything--least of all ofinterference with the Duke's will. It must have been, therefore, noless than an amazing shock to that functionary to find himself all in aninstant stung and staggered by a bolt from the blue. He may have been,like some phlegmatic serpent, conscious of a hornet winging his way; butthat the insect should have had it in its mind to pounce on _him_!

  He found himself and his voice in one metallic clang:--

  'Seize him, men!'

  Carlo panted up, and Jacopo recognised him on the moment.

  'Messer Lanti! Death of the Cross! Is this the Duke's order?'

  'Christ's, old fool!' gasped the cavalier. 'Touch him, I say, and die.I neither know nor care.'

  His great chest was heaving; he whipped out his sword, and stood glaringand at bay. Bembo had thrown himself between the upraised thong and itsquivering victim. He, too, faced the stricken mob.

  'Christ is coming! Christ is coming!' he shrieked. 'Prepare ye all toanswer to Him for this!'

  A dead silence fell. Some turned their faces in terror. Here and therea woman cried out. In the midst, Messer Jacopo raised his eyes to thebattlements, and saw a white hand lifted against the blue. He shruggedround grumpily on his fellows.

  'Unbind him,' he said; and the whip was lowered.

  The poor body sunk beside the post. Bembo knelt, with a sob of pity, towhisper to it--

  'Courage, sad heart! He comes indeed.'

  The livid and suffering face was twisted to view its deliverer.

  'Escape, then,' the blue lips muttered, 'while there is time.'

  Bembo cried out: 'O, thou mistakest who I mean!'

  The face dropped again.

  'Never. Christ or Galeazzo--it is all one.'

  A hand was laid on the boy's shoulder. He looked up to find himselfcaptive to one of the Duke's guard. A grim little troop, steel-bonnetedand armed with halberts, surrounded the stage. Messer Lanti,dismounted, had already committed himself to the inevitable. Headdressed himself, with a laugh, to his friend:--

  'Very well acquitted, little Saint,' said he--'of all but thereckoning.'

  Bembo lingered a moment, pointing down to the bleeding and shatteredbody.

  "'And there passed by a certain priest,"' he cried, '"and likewise aLevite; but a Samaritan had compassion on him,"' and he bowed his head,and went down with the soldiers.

  Now, because of his beauty, or of the fear or of the pity he had wroughtin some of his hearers, for whatever reason a woman or two of the peoplewas emboldened to come and ask the healing of that wounded thing; andthey took it away, undeterred of the executioners, and carried it totheir quarters. And in the meanwhile, Bembo and his comrade werebrought before the Duke.

  Galeazzo had descended from the battlements, and sat in a little room ofthe gatehouse, with only a few, including his wife and child, to attendhim. And his brow was wrinkled, and the lust of fury, beyonddissembling, in his veins. He took no notice of Lanti--though generallywell enough disposed to the bully--but glared, even with some amazementin his rage, on the boy.

  'Who art thou?' he thundered at length.

  'Bernardo Bembo.'

  The clear voice was like the call of a bird's through tempest.

  'Whence comest thou?'

  'From San Zeno in the hills.'

  'What seek'st thou here?'

  'Thy cure.'

  The Duke started, and seemed actually to crouch for a moment. Then,while all held their breath in fear, of a sudden he fell back, andgripped a hand to his heart, and muttered, staring: 'The face!'

  He closed his eyes, and passed a tremulous hand across his brow beforehe looked again; and lo! when he did so, the madness was past.

  'Child,' he said hoarsely, almost whispered, 'what said'st thou? Comenearer: let me look at thee.'

  He rose himself, with the word, stiffly, like an old man, and stoodbefore the boy, and gazing hungrily for a little into the solemn eyes,dropped his own as if abashed--half-blinded. In the background, Bona,his wife, and the child Catherine clung together in a silence of fearand wonder.

  'Ah, I am haunted!' shuddered the tyrant. 'Who told thee that? It is aface, child, a face--there--in the dead watches of the night--behindme--and by day, always the same, a damned clinging bur on my soul--notto be shaken off--always behind me!'

  He gave a little jerk and motion of repugnance, as if he were trying tothrow something off. Carlo struck in: 'Lord, let him sing to thee! Isay no more.'

  The deep, gloomy eyes of the Duke were lifted one instant to the strangeseraph-gaze fixed silently upon him; then, making an acquiescent motionwith his hand, he turned, and sat himself down again as if exhausted,and hid his brow under his palm.

  Now the boy, never looking away, slung forward his lute, and like onethat charms a serpent, began softly to finger the strings. AndGaleazzo's head, in very truth like an adder's, swung to the rhythm; andas the chords rose piercing, he clutched his brow, and as they meltedand sobbed away, so did he sink and moan. And then, suddenly, into thatwild symphony drew the voice, as a spray of sweetbriar is drawn into awheel; and all around caught their breath to listen:--

  'Two children, a boy and girl, were playing between wood and meadow. They pledged their faith, each to the other, with rosy lips on lips, He to protect, she to trust--always together for ever and ever. A storm rose: the dragon of the thunder roared and hissed, Probing the earth with its keen tongue. How she cowered, the pretty, fearful thing! Yet adored her little love to see him dare That tree-cleaving monster with his sword of lath. And in the end, because she trusted in her love, her love prevailed, And drove the roaring terror from the woods. She never felt such faith, nor he such pride of virtue in his strength. Then shone out the rainbow, And he bethought him of the jewelled cup hid at its foot. "Stay here," quoth he, new boldened by his triumph, "And I'll fetch it ye." But she cried to him: "Nay, leveling, take me too! We were to be aye together: O leave me not behind!" But he was already on his way. And still, as he pursued, the rainbow fled before, And the voice of his playmate, faint and fainter, followed in his wake: "O leave me not behind!" Then grew he wild and desperate, clutching at that mirage, the unattainable, The lustrous cup that was to bring him happiness in its possession. And the voice blew ghostly in his wake, mingling with rain and the whirl of dead leaves: "Leave me not behind!" But now the fire of unfulfilment seared his brain, And often he staggered in the slough, Or fell and cut himself on rocks. And so, pushing on half-blindly, Knew not at last from the dead rainbow the _ignis fatuus_, The false witch-light that danced upon his path, Leading him to destruction. Until, lo! With a flash and laugh it was not, And he awoke to a mid-horror of darkness-- Night in the infernal swamps-- Blind, crawling, desolate; and for ever in his heart The weeping shadow of a voice, "O leave me not behind!" Then at that, like one amazed, he turned, And cried in agony: "Innocenza, my lost Innocence, Where art thou? O, little playmate, follow to my call!" And there answered him only from the gates of the sunset a heart-broken sigh.'

  He ended to a deep silence, and, while all stood stricken between tearsand expectancy, moved to within a pace of the Duke.

  'O prince!' he cried, 'haunted of that Innocence! Turn back, turn back,and find in thy lost playmate's face the ghost that now eludes thee!'

  Carlo gave a little gasp, and his hand shivered down to his sword-hilt.He must die for his Saint, if provoked to that martyrdom; but he wouldtake a desperate pledge or two of the sacrifice with him. One of thewomen, the younger, watching him, knew what was in his mind, andbreathed a little scornfully. The other's eyes were set in a sort ofrapture upon the singer's face. A minute may have passed, holding themall thus suspended, when suddenly Galeazzo rose, a
nd, throwing himselfat Bembo's feet, broke into a passion of sobs and moans.

  'Margherita, my little playmate, that liest under the daisies. O, Iwill be good, sweet--I will be good again for thy sake.'